Inane Chatter

Now I have everything I want (for today).  We have a fire blazing in the dining room, and John and I are set up on our laptops across the table from each other.  Riley is on a towel on the floor to my right, and Roxy is on the dog bed in front of the fire.  I have a glass of wine, classical music is coming from the family room, I’m wearing my pretty new shawl from Jess, and if I really want to, I can watch the Super Bowl ads on hulu.com.  I may even turn the TV on at some point during the game (John has expressed an interest in seeing The Who during the half-time show).

We did a lot more shoveling today and managed to get both cars out of and back in to the driveway, so we know we can get out tomorrow.  Then I was done shoveling, but John decided to be a good neighbor and help the downhill neighbors clear their driveway and sidewalk.  I played with the dogs in the backyard.  Then I made John come out with the camera and see it, ’cause it’s really funny to see them try to stay on top of 3 feet of snow.  Which they wouldn’t even try until I jumped in first.

Here’s John shoveling the sidewalk:

And here I made him pose:

And here’s the neighbor with the snowblower who could make a TON of money if he wanted to rent that thing out to his neighbors (or a ton of friends if he wanted to clear everyone’s sidewalks for free):

The poor buried mailbox again:

And the path I dug to it so the mailperson can deliver the mail:

The view down the street:

The view up the street:

The house, with a clear driveway, clear cars, and a TON of snow piled in the yard:

Here’s a short series of Riley in the backyard.  First, sitting nicely but not looking at me:

Second, getting WAY too close to the camera.  That’s his nose in the top right corner.

Third, Riley singing “STOP in the name of love!”:

Me and Riley swimming through the snow:

Roxy coming over to see what’s up:

And here she is, glad to get away before the wrestling and the hand-chewing started:

The hand-chewing started when I grabbed Riley’s lower jaw:

Riley, trying to crouch in the snow and failing miserably:

And here, apparently, he’s trying to fly, but his little ears just aren’t big enough:

Riley and I are sitting on top of 3 feet of snow and..yelling at each other?

And here’s a series of Roxy going “Okay.  Enough with the yelling and playing.  Can we go inside where it’s warm now?  What is WRONG with you people?”

Riley’s sneak attack…

…Ended with kisses:

Then he went back to my hands (coated in bacon maybe?):

Apparently, my hair was coated in bacon, too:

Riley officially won, though, by STANDING on me as I tried to get up:

Okay, enough pictures.  Really.  And it may look like I was having fun in the snow, but don’t believe everything you see on the internet.  That smile was photoshopped.  I had a dream last night that the snow had melted away overnight and I was so happy.  Then I woke up.  Snow snucks.

The snow just stopped.  Maybe 15 minutes ago.  And the sun is out.  Our total is somewhere around 30 inches, maybe a little more in places.  Definitely more in the corners of our yard.  When we were shoveling this morning, the sidewalks (which were a little lower than the yard) had 24″ of snow.  We spent a couple of hours shoveling the driveway and part of the sidewalk, mostly to make sure we could get the car out if we really had to.  Tomorrow we’ll tackle what fell after we quit, the rest of the sidewalk, and we’ll try to dig John’s car out.  If he can swing it, I really think he should work from home on Monday.  The roads will be terrible.  We had a plow come through sometime last night, maybe early this morning, but none since then.  Our street has at least a foot of snow.  Snow snow-snow, snow-snow-snow.  I’m tired of it.  And it’s way too deep for the dogs.  The first thing we did today was clear a path on the deck, clear the deck stairs, and shovel out an area in the yard so they could get around.  They can blaze their own paths from there, although they really haven’t this time.  They’ve stayed under the deck overhang, where the snow isn’t as deep.  Mark asked for pictures (apparently, he needs proof – Hi, Mark!), so here they are.  Maybe it’ll all disappear overnight.  I’m ready for spring!

Snow depth on the bench around 9:30 last night:

Snow depth on the bench as of about 9:30 this morning (through the sliding glass door with snow on it):

Snow depth on the bench around 4:45 this afternoon:

The back corner of the yard yesterday afternoon (3-ish, I think):

The back corner of the yard around 4:45 today:

My flower bed, buried:

An evergreen in the neighbor’s yard, yesterday:

Same evergreen, after the snow stopped today:

Out the front door this morning:

The driveway, before shoveling:

John shoveling the driveway:

The house, after shoveling (and the buried mailbox):

The neighbors, also shoveling:

And Roxy, peeing in the clearing we shoveled for her:

You’re welcome. 

So yeah, we have lots of snow.  We came in from shoveling around 11:30 or so, showered, and then had breakfast even though it was after noon.  Hot chocolate (of course), cereal (Wegman’s version of Lucky Charms), and muffins.  And we watched a little TV.  Since then, I’ve been messing around on the internet, and John has been stealing cars and beating people up.  Seriously.  Oh, yeah, and we’re drinking champagne that’s been in the fridge since New Year’s.  It’s better aged. 

The DC area’s second giant snowstorm of the season is here, and I really don’t like the name they’ve chosen.  I think they called the December storm “Snowpocalypse”, and they’re calling this one “Snowmageddon”.  “Snowmageddon” is weak, so here are some names I like better:

Snowmygod (heard on the radio)

Snowzilla

Mt. Snowverest

I Can’t Believe It’s Not Snowing – hm, that’s for when the storm is over.

And there I get stuck.  I need more ideas.  In the meantime, here are some pictures as of about 2:15 this afternoon:

And a bonus funny picture of Riley:

The Snowhemoth

The Abominable Snowstorm

The Snow Has Eyes

You know, I’m really not even a little bit (okay, maybe just a little bit) interested in doing all of the coding for my website (or any website), but I LOVE that I understand it enough to be able to tweak what already exists.  I think that’s really cool.  Here’s version #3, which I like better than both 1 and 2.  Not necessarily better than the original, but if I go back to that version, I make take some things about this one with me.  Here’s the screen shot for future review:

I don’t have much else going on tonight.  John got home a little bit ago, and if I can get him to stop playing his guitar, we can eat dinner.

Here he is!

Update (during the State of the Union address): I love Joe Biden’s tie!  See?

The rearranging is done, but I have all sorts of plans to make our house look like a place where actual grown-ups live, so if the rooms look not quite finished, that’s why.

Dining room:

Family room:

Library (I should have taken these pictures in the morning – better light for this room):

Thank you for playing this edition of Musical Rooms.

I tried to wash my windshield on my drive home this evening before the car had warmed up all the way.  The fluid wasn’t frozen or anything, but as soon as the wipers stopped, the moisture that was left crystallized, then melted away.  It was SO cool.  I did it a couple more times, just so I could watch the ice crystals.  No, I didn’t rear end anyone.

My first week is over, and, while I’d rather not be working at all, I think I like my new job.  You know, enough.  And I certainly like my new co-workers.  I spent the week learning this system (so I can teach it in a few weeks).  (That sounds like I learned it all this week.  I didn’t.)  I was the guinea pig for one of the other new trainers to practice on.  He’s young (22, I think) and kinda nervous about teaching, but he’s funny.  This afternoon, we needed clarification on a particular contract type for acquisitions.  We’re talking about government acquisitions, for government agencies, and the example he came up with to describe how we think it works is puppies.  As in, let’s say the government needs to buy puppies.  They cost $100 each.  We award a contract to buy 12 puppies.  Then we discover we need more puppies.  We (me and the more experienced trainer we were asking for help from) couldn’t listen with a straight face.  Puppies!  In bulk!  I would love to work for that agency.

Puppies!

Seriously, who can resist this?

Really, I think I’m glad to be back at work, in a job I know I can be really good at.  “Relieved” may be a better word than “glad”.  Starting a new job, dealing with new people, having to get up early again and figure out a whole new schedule is stressful, but earning again takes a lot of stress away that I didn’t realize I had.  Mm.  Not true.  I knew I was stressed about that.  But I feel better.  And I’ll feel even better than this when I get my first paycheck.  (And my second.  And my third…)

Enough of that.  It’s the weekend!

I just met the family who contacted me about the piano.  They want it!  Piano adoption is complete.  It will go to its new home over the weekend, probably, after they figure out whose trailer they can borrow.  I met the mom, the dad, and the little girl who’s taking lessons.  I think she’s about 8 or 9.  Definitely between 7 and 10.  They’re very nice people and very appreciative.  The little girl was thrilled.  Once her dad coaxed her to the keys, she played (mostly messing around (chopsticks and that other thing we used to play all the time (not “Heart and Soul” – the other thing)) and making noise, but it was fun piano noise) the whole rest of the time they were here.  They measured (it’ll fit), and I offered to let them go through my piano music when they come back and take what they want (with the exception of a few things I want to hold on to, of course).  Family, if there’s any music you want me to hold on to for you, tell me before Saturday.  The little girl (the parents don’t play) has been practicing on a keyboard (not full-size), so this is working out perfectly for them.  And for me.  The piano is going to a good home where it will be put to good use.  And of course, I told them all about its history (including the cracked harp and the messed up finish).  I told them I checked with you guys before making this decision, and the mom asked me to pass on her thanks.  So, thanks, family, for letting me give our piano to a new family to love.

Am I getting too maudlin?

On the advice of John’s grandmother’s live-in aide, Cheryl, we asked his new stylist, Jenny, to model his new haircut after Sting’s hair.  See exhibits A and B (we took these pictures with us):

Now, see John’s very cool, very Sting-like hair:

We’re discussing the possibility of a beard.  Short, a little scruffy, but neat.  And new glasses.  It’s almost like having a new husband!  Not that I was looking for one.    I like mine.

Here you go, Mom.  John took a bunch of pictures so you (and everyone else) can see my new haircut, properly blow-dried and hair-sprayed, in advance of us going out for Mexican food tonight.  ‘Cause you just can’t go out for Mexican food unless your hair looks good.  Please ignore the face and just look at the hair.

I know there are people out there who think gift cards are the cop-out gift, the gift that says, “I didn’t put any thought into what to buy you for this occasion”, but I’m not one of those people.  I suppose a gift card could say that, if you received one for something you have no interest in, but I’m talking about the ones that say, “I know you really like books, but I have no idea what you have already or what you might want, so here.  Go shopping.”  Or, “You said you need clothes, and you want clothes, but I’ll just mess up the sizes or the colors or the style, so here.  Go shopping.”  I LOVE those.  And my family tends to come through for me, as evidenced by the years of Amazon and Ann Taylor gift cards.  They’re perfect.  I don’t mean to say that I don’t appreciate the sweater or the DVD, ’cause I do, and I like them very much, and I’m thrilled that you know me well enough to pick out the right sweater and DVD.  But it’s so much FUN to actually do the shopping and the picking out that I feel like I got TWO gifts.

My point is that today was my big shopping day.  By 11am, I’d been to three stores: 1) Kohl’s, so I could exchange pants for John, 2) Target, ’cause John needs cushion-y socks for his work shoes, and 3) the Ann Taylor Factory Store in the outlet mall so I could spend my fabulous gift cards on fabulous work clothes for my new job (that starts next week!  Yikes!).  From there I went to the mall mall to look for a headband at Lord & Taylor (which I did not find – maybe it’s supposed to be at Ann Taylor Loft?) and to use my Banana Republic gift card.  I could have used it at the Banana Republic in the outlet mall, but I cruised quickly through that store and didn’t see anything I liked.  At the one in the mall mall, however, I found that sweater I was drooling over with Mom in the mall in KY in the perfect GREEN shade I like so much, and I bought it for $34.99!  (It was $59.99 two weeks ago.  Yay for sales.)  And I got a cream cami (with satin-ish trim) to go under it AND they gave me an extra 10% off just for using my gift card.  Yay for retail desperation.

Here is a badly aimed (and blurry) picture of the two of us outside the restaurant before dinner last night:

Blurry as it is, this picture is far better than our other attempts.  We asked the hostess to take one before we were seated, but it’s too far away and overexposed.  The ones we took after we got home have strange expressions and double chins.  (The photos themselves, not us.)  Not okay for internet viewing.

Shoveling is made harder when there are 19 inches of snow and only one snow shovel.  I was using the regular shovel.  Not as efficient.  It took us more than two hours to clear the driveway, the cars, and the sidewalk.  Then John cleared the deck.

Also, our shopping is basically done.  Yay!

Now, pictures.

Here’s the bench on the deck after the snow stopped last night:

View of the deck before shoveling this morning (through the sliding glass doors):

The deck after John shoveled:

Some pictures of the yard:

And some pictures of Roxy in the snow:

It’s 3:40pm, we have over a foot of snow (judging by the undisturbed pile on top of the table on the deck), and it’s still coming down.  This is nuts.  We could probably leave the house if we really needed to, in the Tucson with 4-wheel drive on, but the roads haven’t been plowed (not in the neighborhood, at least) and we have everything we need here.  I got home last night right about 5pm, let the dogs out, unloaded the car, and went back right back out to Wegman’s.  We have plenty of food.  Good stuff, too.

The snow started before we went to bed last night, and we had 4-6 inches when we woke up.  John went out front to shovel (we figured it would be easier to shovel at the end if we made a dent in the beginning), and I played in the back with the dogs.  We shoveled the deck, too, but that was three and a half hours ago and it’s like we were never outside, front or back.  I just let the dogs out again, and Riley didn’t even bother to leave the deck at first.  He just peed on a pile of snow.  ON the deck.  I can’t blame him.  It doesn’t really matter.  But they love the snow.  Riley more than Roxy.

We didn’t eat breakfast until about noon (since we shoveled and played first).  We have a fire, we’re watching TV, John is doing some programming stuff, and I’ve been reading during the commercials.  We’ll probably switch to movies (other than those that happen to be on right now) soon, like White Christmas.  Seems appropriate.    We were watching Keeping the Faith earlier.  I love that movie.  It was on TBS or USA or something, so it was edited a bit, but I love it anyway.

And here are the pictures.

View of the deck table around 9:30am:

View of the bench around 9:30am:

View of the deck table after we let the dogs out:

View of the deck table about 5 hours later:

View of the bench around 3:30pm:

Sister Mary Riley:

Obi-wan Riley:

A good (normal) picture of Riley:

And Riley’s warning look: “Back off, buddy, I’d had about enough of you and that camera.”